


After The Fall

by DaviesInTheMaking



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-30
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-06-18 21:07:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15494712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaviesInTheMaking/pseuds/DaviesInTheMaking
Summary: After the fall in the season three finale, Will and Hannibal disappear for a month and a half before Will comes back home to be with Molly. He tries to go back to normal and says he doesn't know where Hannibal is, but he's hiding a secret. And that secret is a certain cannibal who will never not be a part of Will.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I recently got obsessed with Hannibal and this is my first Hannibal fic. I've got a lot planned for this and I hope you enjoy it. Please let me know what you think.

Will walked slowly up the driveway to the house that he shared with Molly, a month and a half after he and Hannibal had fallen off the cliff. As he approached the house, he was glad that he’d chosen to come back on a school day, so he would be able to talk to only Molly first.

When he was about two hundred yards away from the house, a round of loud barking erupted and a pack of over dozen dogs burst out of the house and down the stairs, all of them bounding towards him at full speed. He knelt on the ground but was still knocked over when the dogs jumped on him. He tried to pet all of them at the same time and tears escaped from his eyes. He missed all of them so much and had been even more upset when Hannibal wouldn’t let him have as many dogs as he wanted to. Winston moved through the crowd and stood in front of him when he sat up and just looked at him for a moment before licking his face and stepping closer, so Will could hug him. Among the crowd, Will saw a couple of new dogs and one whose testicles were big enough that he knew the dog had to be Randy.

“Will?”

Will’s hands kept running over the dogs, but the rest of him froze as he looked up at Molly, standing six feet away from him. She was as beautiful as he remembered and the second he saw her, he felt another stab of love and longing. There wasn’t much that he felt bad about with how everything turned out, but he did feel bad about leaving the dogs, Molly, and Walter. She didn’t deserve what happened, she didn’t ask to have a damaged husband who profiled killers for a living and had a history with a psychopathic murdering cannibal. Will wished that he could make everything better for her and, in a way, that was what she’d been trying to do by falling off the cliff.

He stood up and just returned her stare while the dogs roiled around their legs. She had cut her hair to her shoulders and her bangs were gone, but otherwise, she looked the same, aside from being shocked and hurt. He could tell by flicking his eyes up and down that she hadn’t been outside all day, even though it was one-thirty, and he didn’t think she’d done much venturing off of their property—her property, really—over the last month and a half. He also saw that she hadn’t been sleeping well and he saw hints of redness in her eyes that said she’d been crying, but not that day.

“Hi,” he eventually said, licking his lips and swallowing the rock in his throat.

“Hi.” Her voice and eyes were both wary, but not like she was afraid of him. It was more like she was afraid that he would just leave again or that he wasn’t there at all. He briefly wondered if she had been experiencing any hallucinations, but she’d never had any in the past, had no history of mental illness, and wouldn’t take any drugs that would cause hallucinations. She was probably just worried for normal reasons. Not that anything was normal about their situation.

“I got your letter,” she told him, her arms folded tight across her chest. “I, um…” She looked down and reached to pet Rover. “Before I got it, I—we, really, all of us…” She looked back up at him and the tears he saw in her eyes made his own vision blur a bit. “We thought you were dead.” Her voice broke on the last word and two tears broke free and slid down her cheeks. She sniffed once, took a deep breath, and wiped her tears away. “And even after we got it, Jack and Alana said that it was basically like you were dead because you weren’t gonna come back.”

His heart broke even more, and he felt her pain magnified by his own. He didn’t bother wiping away his few tears as they slid down his cheeks. “Molly, I’m sorry.” He looked into her eyes and tried to convey how much he missed her and how much he loved her and how sorry he was. “I am so, so sorry that I put you through that.”

“Are you gonna leave again? Or are you here?” She was hopeful and scared and wary, and he could tell that she needed him to be there but didn’t like the fact that she needed him so much.

He slowly walked up to her and started to reach for her hand, but her arms were still crossed, and she didn’t notice his reaching. He considered putting a hand on her face, but thought that would be too much too soon, so he just looked at her and said, “I’m here.”

Immediately after he uttered those words, she threw her arms around him and held him tight enough to hurt. He was shocked for a moment before he returned the embrace and started crying when he felt her tears on his shoulder. They stood like that for about two minutes before she pulled away and wiped off her tears, still holding one of his hands with hers.

“Um, do you wanna…? D’you wanna go inside? Have some coffee?”

He heard the awkwardness in her voice, but didn’t hold it against her. “Yeah. That would be nice.”

They started toward the house and after about five steps, he felt her take his hand, twining her fingers with his. He looked at her in slight surprise and she smiled at him in a gentle and loving way. He smiled back at her and they walked together up the stairs to the house and into the kitchen. He sat at the table while she put coffee on and then sat in front of him while it made.

“I should probably call Jack,” she remarked, her eyes on the table where she was running her fingers over and through his fingers.

“You’ve been talking to him?” he asked curiously, his eyes taking in every inch of her face.

She nods nonchalantly. “He came to talk to me a couple days after the swan dive—that’s what we started calling it after your letter, it was just the slaying before that.”

“The slaying?” He raised his eyebrows in skeptical amusement.

She smiled and gave him a glance. “I know, it’s weird. But yeah, he kept me updated about everything. And Alana and I have had a few discussions about you and how I was feeling and how it affected me.”

“Is she your therapist now?”

“I wouldn’t say that. More like she’s just become somewhat of a friend. Someone I could talk to who’s known you for a while.” She exhaled laughter and looked at him, her hands still on his. “They’re gonna go wild when they know that you’re back.”

He smiled and looked down. “Are you gonna call him?”

“I will later.” She got up, got coffee for them, and sat back down across from him. “Will.”

He looked back up into her eyes and saw that she suddenly looked concerned.

“Are you okay?”

Will didn’t know how to answer that. Not really, anyway. If he didn’t think about the last month and a half and just focused on being there with his wife, then he was fine, but if he actually thought about what happened… “I am now.”

She smiled gently, and he smiled back in silence for a moment.

“How’s Walter doing?”

She took a breath and drank some of her coffee. “He’s fine. He’s missed you. He also thinks of you as kind of a cool celebrity now.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah, after you disappeared, and we heard that you killed the Dragon, he started researching you and asking Jack about you and found out all he could. A lot of which was from some website called tattlecrime.com. Yeah, we heard that Freddie Lounds isn’t exactly the best person,” she added when he rolled his eyes. “But he found out a lot about the work that you’ve done and that guy that you killed and how you were wounded by Hannibal Lecter in that massacre a few years back and now you’re kind of like his hero.”

That surprised Will more than anything else that day. It was very difficult for him to believe that someone could find out about everything he’d done and admire him more for it.

“He’s also had numerous conversations with his friends about having you as a step-father and he take every opportunity he can to mention that you’re his step-father. He’s even started calling you ‘Dad’.”

Will looked at her, his jaw a bit open. “Really?”

“Yeah,” she said with a soft smile. “He’s really proud of you.”

“For what? I’m a hero and I didn’t have to kill that first man.”

“But you have helped the FBI catch a lot of killers and you did kill the man who tried to kill us.”

Will shrugged. “Hannibal helped with that. If it wasn’t for him, I would have died.”

She drank her coffee and examined him for a while. “He’s still alive, isn’t he?”

“He is,” he tells Molly, his smile gone.

She nodded and thought for a moment. “Do you know where he is?”

“No.” He said it with absolute certainty and he knew she would believe him.

They were quiet for a moment while they drank their coffee and pet the dogs.

“Will, what happened to you?” she eventually asked. “In your letter, you said that you and Hannibal killed the Dragon and you took Hannibal over the cliff and that you were fine, but what happened? Jack said that your whole plan to fake Hannibal’s escape didn’t go as you had planned—what happened to that? And where were you? Why did it take you so long to come back here? How did you survive that fall?” She stared solidly into his eyes, demanding answers, but not wanting to be aggressive.

He took a deep breath and kept his eyes on the dogs for a minute, trying to decide what he wanted to tell her. Finally, he looked back at the table, keeping one hand on Winston’s head. “Dolarhyde found us en route. He made it a real escape. He left, Hannibal and I went to a house that he was familiar with, then the Dragon found us again. We fought him, we won, and I took him over the cliff. I wanted us to die.”

She leaned forward and gently touched his cheek where Dolarhyde had stabbed him. “But you didn’t.”

He finally looked up and took her hand in his. “No. I didn’t.”

“What happened after you fell? Or would you rather talk about it with me and Jack at the same time so you don’t have to repeat yourself?”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “That would probably be best.”

“I’ll go call him.” She pulled her hand from his, took out her phone, and dialed. “Hey, Jack… Will’s back.” She briefly glanced at him, a hint of amusement in her eyes. “About five minutes ago. I assumed you would wanna come see him… Yeah, at my house… Same as always… Not really. He told me that Dolarhyde was responsible for the real escape, but not much else. He also said that Hannibal is still alive…. Okay. See you soon. He’s on his way,” she told Will as she hung up the phone.

“Was he surprised?” he asked, knowing that Jack was.

“About you being here, or about Hannibal being alive?”

“Both, I guess.”

She nodded. “He was. He asked how you look.”

“How has he been doing?”

“He’s fine,” she said with a shrug, taking his hand again. “I think he feels bad about losing you like he did. He really cares about you, Will.”

“I know… So, who are these new guys?” he asked, gesturing down to the dogs still around them. 

\--------------------------------------

Jack arrived about twenty minutes later, by which time, Will and Molly had moved to one of the living room couches, the dogs around and next to them.

“I’ll get it,” Molly said when they heard a banging on the front door.

Will sat there with Buster on his lap and Winston beside him, his chest constricting a bit with nerves. He had no reason to be nervous, but he was. Maybe it was because Molly was slightly nervous, which he assumed was due to uncertainty about how Jack would react. He kept his eyes and hands on his dogs as Molly and Jack spoke.

“Where is he?” he heard Jack demand, his voice eager and nervous and filled with excited disbelief.

“In the living room,” Molly replied calmly.

Will heard Jack walk down the hall and into the room with forced slowness and he looked up as Jack came into the room and stared at him. He looked like he was seeing a ghost, which he was in a way. Will could feel his immense disbelief at seeing him again and relief that he seemed like he was okay. He didn’t say anything, he just stared at Will with wide eyes, his jaw hanging slightly open.

“Hi, Jack,” he said simply, maintaining eye contact.

“Will.” It was a greeting and an expression of marvel.

“I would get up, but…” Will gestured to the dog still on his lap.

“Do you wanna take a seat, Jack?” Molly asked from behind Jack’s shoulder.

Jack jerked his head a bit to the side without moving his eyes from Will. He briefly looked away from Will to look at a chair near the couch and back again as he slowly sat down.

“Do you want any coffee? Tea? Water? Whiskey?” Molly asked.

“Um, whiskey, please,” Jack replied, glancing back at Molly.

“Will do.” She turned and headed back into the kitchen.

Jack turned back and stared at him again and Will knew that he was still trying to convince himself that Will was actually real and there. Will maintained eye contact sporadically and they sat that way until Molly came back, handed Jack his drink, and sat on the couch beside Winston.

Jack downed half of his whiskey before he managed to say something. “You’re here. And you look…fine.” Will knew that Jack had expected him to look severely injured, like he’d escaped from being held captive, and was shocked that he looked completely normal. Except for the scar on his face. “How are you…? Will, what happened? You said in that letter that you and Hannibal fell off that cliff—how did you survive that? Where have you been? Why didn’t you come back sooner?” He drank the rest of his whiskey and took a deep, steadying breath. “We found three different people’s blood at the crime scene: Dolarhyde’s, Hannibal’s, and yours. And Will, there was a lot of blood. How are you alive? What happened?”

Will hesitated for a moment. “The Dragon found us during the fake escape and jumped us. He left me and Hannibal alive and left. Hannibal drove us to that house, we waited there, and then the Dragon came. We fought him, killed him, and then I took us over the cliff… I was hoping that we would die.” He felt Molly’s shock and fear and confusion, but she didn’t say anything, and he didn’t want to see the emotions in her eyes. “I’m not sure how we survived the fall. I was knocked out really fast and when I woke up, I was lying on a grassy bank and Hannibal was sitting near me. He got us to his house, patched our wounds, and the next day, we went to Hinsdale County, Colorado and found a place to stay.”

“How did you get there? Hannibal’s cards are expired and he’s not exactly anonymous.”

“We drove. And Hannibal has a lot of resources.”

Jack ran a hand firmly over his face. “Jesus, Will. We all thought you were in some other country, somewhere in Europe.”

Will shrugged, idly scratching the back of Buster’s neck. “He thought it would be best to go somewhere relatively close to heal. Otherwise, we would have gone to his place in Paris.”

“Why didn’t you tell us more in your letter? Was Hannibal keeping you there?”

“He wasn’t forcing me to be there.” He didn’t want to directly say that he wanted to stay there because he didn’t want to upset Molly, but he knew she was already upset and was already questioning why he didn’t come back sooner. “I was hurt worse than him, so I was kind of stuck there for a while.”

“How bad were you hurt?” Molly asked.

He looked over at her and was proud of her for reigning in all her emotions and keeping a straight face. He loved her for that and so many other things. “I was stabbed in the face, stabbed in the chest, and thrown around.” He pointed to the wound locations. “When we fell, I hit my head on a rock and then my side hit another rock, breaking three of my ribs. Hannibal was shot in the side and a bit banged up by the fall, but the gunshot was his only major wound.”

“How long did it take you to drive to Colorado?”

“A couple of days.”

“Where did you stay the night?” Jack asked. “We checked your credit card records and didn’t find anything.”

“He wanted to stay in a five-star hotel, but I convinced him we should stay in a motel. He paid for it with cash.”

“And no one recognized either of you?”

Will shook his head.

“Why Colorado?”

“The place he chose is remarkably isolated.”

Molly sighed in irritation and impatience. “Why is Hannibal alive, Will? You know I’m not usually all for murder, but after everything he’s done to you, us, Jack, and everyone else, why didn’t you kill him? That was what you wanted to do with your swan dive, wasn’t it?”

He turned to her, looking deep into her eyes and not knowing what to say. He knew that he was putting everyone in danger by leaving Hannibal alive, but he also knew that he couldn’t betray Hannibal again.

“I don’t know,” he said honestly.

“Will.” Jack waited until Will turned back to him, his eyes hard and serious. “Where is he?”

“I don’t know, Jack.”

“How did you get back here? Did he bring you back?”

“I took a couple of different buses.”

He felt a hand on top of the one he had on Winston and turned to see Molly with a small, loving smile on her face. He smiled back, glad that she was starting to forgive him for being gone.

“Will, where exactly were you staying?”

“Piedra in Hinsdale County,” Will told Jack.

“And do you think Hannibal is still there?”

“Jack, I honestly don’t know.”

“Are you in contact with him? Do you have his number?”

Will shook his head. “I’m not and I don’t.”

“Walter’s gonna be home soon,” Molly chimed in. “He’s gonna be thrilled to see you, Will. Jack, do you wanna stay for dinner?”

“No, I’ll let you all be together. Will, are you gonna be coming back to work with us?”

Will looked to Molly, seeking her opinion.

“I don’t know. I mean, I know that helping the FBI is something that some part of you will always need to do, but the last time you did, someone tried to kill me, and Walter and you got seriously hurt and disappeared for a month and a half.”

“We could protect you,” Jack said to her. “If there’s ever any shred of threat against you, we could send people to make sure that no one gets to you.”

Molly didn’t acknowledge his words. “I know you never said anything and didn’t want to admit it to yourself, but for the years we were together before Jack came for you, I saw how you were whenever you saw a story about a murder. I know you felt some measure of guilt and like you could have done something to prevent it.”

“I don’t want you two to get hurt again,” Will told her.

“We’ll talk about it,” she said to Jack. “We’ll let you know.”

Jack nods and stands, placing his glass on the coffee table. “I’ll leave you two alone, then. Will, I’m glad you’re okay.” He holds out a hand and Will shakes it firmly. “Keep in touch, even if you decide to not come back.”

“I’ll make sure he does. I’ll walk you out.” Molly stands and walks with him to the door. When she comes back, she sits in the chair Jack had vacated to be able to talk to Will easier. “Do you wanna talk about it now or give it some time?”

“I’m thinking more the latter.”

She smiles at him and gently guides Winston off of the couch, sitting down and curling up against Will, pulling his arm across her shoulders. “It’s so good to have you back.”

“I’m glad to be back.”

“I love you, Will.”

“I love you too, Molly.”

 

\---------------------------------------

That night, when Molly and Walter are asleep, Will takes one of the cars and drives about twenty minutes on almost exclusively back roads. Eventually, he comes to a modest-sized cottage buried in the forest. All of the lights were on and smoke curled from the ornate chimney and Will knew that there was a sleek motorcycle and a Mercedes hidden behind the house. Will parked beside the house, took a couple of deep breaths, and got out of the car. He walked slowly up to the house, goes through the door without knocking, through the living room, and into the spacious kitchen.

He’s standing with his back to Will, focusing on the cooking, but when Will stops in the doorway, he slowly stops what he’s doing. He looks up, sniffs, and turns to face him.

“Hello, Will,” Hannibal greeted, affection in his eyes and his small smile.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is going back in time to right after Hannibal and Will fell from the cliff and what ensues in the aftermath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to the people who have already read this and given kudos and thanks to New_day for commenting on it! I originally thought that in this chapter, I would cover everything that Will and Hannibal were up to right after the fall, but that ended up being too much stuff, so I'm just gonna slip in flashback-type chapters at various points in this series. I really hope you all like this chapter. Let me know what you think!

Chapter Two

Will moved one arm around Hannibal’s neck, held him tighter, and took the both of them over the cliff. Hannibal didn’t struggle as they fell, and Will pictured Molly and Walter before his head slammed into a rock and he saw nothing. 

He woke up coughing up water and gasping. His head throbbed and stung, his face and chest stung and burned where he’d been stabbed, and his right ribcage burned and ached. The open night sky and the bright full moon were above him and he felt wet grass under his hands. 

“Oh good, you’re awake.”

He slowly looked to his right and saw Hannibal sitting next to him, his legs up, arms on his knees. Hannibal was looking at him without much concern or surprise. “Can you sit up?”

Will tried to use both hands to push himself up, but bolts of pain shot up his right hand and arm when he put pressure on it. He used his left hand and arm to slowly push himself up into a sitting position, his breath heaving with the effort. “You don’t seem surprised. Or upset,” he panted. 

“I am under constant suspicion that you’ll try to kill me again. And that wouldn’t have been a bad way to die.”

“Why didn’t we die?” Will asked, holding his hurt arm against his chest. 

“Perhaps some greater force wanted us to live.” He winced, and his hand moved to his side where he’d gotten shot. 

“We need to get to a hospital,” Will said, moving around so that he was leaning sideways on his arm. 

“No, not a hospital. Back up to the house. It will be days before the authorities find it and there is still medical equipment there.”

“And how exactly are we going to get there? Where are we?”

Hannibal slowly stood up, wincing and hissing and panting. When he was upright, he reached a hand out to Will. “Can you stand?”

The position made Will flash back to several minutes ago after they’d managed to kill the Dragon. Again, Will took his hand and Hannibal pulled him to his feet. He again gripped Hannibal’s shoulder and stood there, shaking and panting. 

“We are about thirteen miles from the house. I suggest we steal a car and use that to get there.”

Will breathed heavily a moment before looking up and into Hannibal’s eyes. “Tell me again how we’re not dead.”

He breathed a chuckle and used his free hand to caress the side of Will’s head, being careful to avoid his wound. “I am honestly not certain about that myself. Come. We should get back soon so that I can care for our wounds.”

He helped Will up the grassy bank and a few yards over to the side of a road. Once they got there, Hannibal put Will down onto the ground and held out a hand. 

“Hannibal, it’s late at night and we’re not exactly in a place with a lot of traffic. I doubt you’re gonna actually get anyone’s attention.”

“Patience, Will,” Hannibal said without looking back. 

Will sighed and winced and hissed at the pain in his side. 

After a few minutes, he saw headlights in the distance and briefly thought that it could be Jack. But then he saw that it was a large pick-up truck and he was flooded with disappointment. The car slowed and stopped, probably because, even though the water had washed away a lot of blood on both of them, they were both still clearly injured. 

“Can I help you men?” an old man asks in concern and worry, not recognizing either of them. “You all look like you need a doctor.”

“Yes, we fell from the cliff and are severely injured. Especially my friend, here.” He gestured to Will still on the ground. “Would you please help me move him into the car?”

“Yeah, of course.” The man opens his door and hops down. Once he’s bent over Will, Hannibal caught him in a stranglehold and easily held him like that until he fell unconscious. 

Hannibal dropped him on the ground beside Will and helped Will up and into the passenger seat. 

“Wait,” Will said as Hannibal’s hand moved toward the gear shift. 

Hannibal looked at him in surprise. “What? He’s not dead, just unconscious.” 

“I know.” Will reached to the backseat and grabbed the jacket that was there and the cell phone on top of it. “Just toss this on him,” he sighed, his voice tight with pain. 

Hannibal took the jacket and phone, put the phone in a pocket, and threw the jacket out the open window. “Anything else?”

Will just glared at him, his good hand on his ribcage. 

“Well, all right.” He shifts the car into drive and starts up the road. 

After about fifteen minutes, they’re back at the house. With everything that just happened there, Will was mildly surprised that the house still looked the same from that angle. Hannibal parked, got out, and started to shuffle to the other side of the car, but Will got out before he could help him. 

“I’m fine,” he said, aware of how his breath was still unsteady and he was only upright because he was holding onto the car.

“Of course, you are,” Hannibal replied, hooking Will’s arm across his shoulders and helping him into the house. He put Will on a sofa and hobbled down the hall. 

Will sat there, gently probing his ribs, his chest, his cheek, and the side of his head. His hand came back bloody from his face, chest, and head and as he looked at his bloody hand, he saw it shaking significantly. Every part of him hurt and all he wanted was to sleep and not have to feel anything. It finally hit him that he hadn’t done what he’d wanted to. He had wanted Hannibal to die, he’d wanted to die himself, but that didn’t happen. Hannibal was still alive. 

The disappointment fell on him and he didn’t know what to do. He should probably call Jack or try to kill Hannibal again, but he didn’t want to. He didn’t think he even could. He didn’t know what to do, he didn’t know what he wanted, he was just so exhausted. All he felt was pain and tiredness. At least he’d written down the recipe for his dog food and emailed it to Molly. 

Hannibal shuffled back into the room, his shirt off, a medical bag under his arm. He practically fell onto the wooden coffee table in front of the couch and started pulling out instruments. 

“Remove your shirt,” Hannibal told him, his voice tight. 

“Shouldn’t you take care of yourself first?” Will asked, looking down at the bullet hole in his side. 

“Your injuries are more numerous and severe than mine.” Hannibal just stared at him until he sighed and slowly pulled off his shirt, wincing in pain. Once he’d dropped it onto the couch beside him, Hannibal moved in and began tending to Will’s injuries. 

Hannibal stitched Will’s cheek and chest, bandaged the cuts on his face and arms, gave him a shot just above his ribs, and retrieved an ice pack for him to hold gently against his ribs. Once that was done, he started taking care of his own wounds. After examining and prodding around the bullet wounds for a bit, he stitched up the exit wound and started trying to figure out how to take care of his entry wound. 

“Turn around,” Will told him, sitting up with a groan. 

“Will, you’ve never administered stitches before.”

“I just watched you do it. I think I’ve got it.” He took the needles and thread from Hannibal, grateful his hands had stopped shaking, and pushed at his body until he turned so that Will could take care of his wound. 

“There,” he said after he finished bandaging Hannibal. He sat back and pressed the ice pack back against his side. 

“Well, it doesn’t feel as if you butchered me, so I suppose I’m grateful,” Hannibal remarked, standing back up and going back down the hall. 

“You’re welcome,” Will called, leaning his head back against the couch. 

Several minutes later, Hannibal came back into the room dressed in a new, clean outfit. There was a suitcase in his hand and some clothes draped over his arm. He put the clothes down on the coffee table and went to sit in one of the armchairs, the suitcase on the floor beside him. 

“Put those on and then we’ll leave.”

Will sat up and moved around the black slacks, gray button-up, and black jacket before looking up at Hannibal. “Leave and go where?”

“I would normally suggest property that I have in France, but I believe it would be best for us to go somewhere closer so that we can have a chance to heal. My recommendation is Hinsdale, Colorado. The atmosphere fits with your preferences, it’s close enough, and the town itself is one of the most isolated places in North America. Is that suitable for you?”

Will thought for a moment, his eyes on the clothes. “Shouldn’t we wait until tomorrow? So we can have time to get some rest?”

“You can sleep in the car. I don’t require any rest at the moment. And when I do, you can either drive, or we can stop at a hotel.”

Will thought about arguing, about refusing to go with Hannibal, but he knew there would be no point to it. Hannibal wanted him to go with him, and Will was just too tired and aching to refuse him. He stood and took the clothes with him down the hall and into one of the bedrooms he found. 

As he changed, he thought about Molly and Walter and tried to figure out why he wasn’t choosing to go back to them. He knew that he had a special connection to Hannibal and had since he’d met him, but he also had a connection with Molly. He loved her more than he’d ever loved anyone, and she had given him so much joy and comfort.

At the same time, he felt like he couldn’t go back to her and he needed to go with Hannibal. He felt like he’d changed too much in just a few days of being away from her. He supposed he could either have Hannibal or Molly, but it was impossible for him to have both. He also remembered how Dolarhyde had tried to kill her and Walter and he didn’t want to ever put them in that kind of danger again. Maybe he should contact her, though, just to make sure she knows he’s alive, but he was too drained to decide anything. 

Once he was dressed, he made his way back into the living room. Once Hannibal saw him, he stood and crossed the room to the front door. “After you, Will.”

Will crossed the room, walked outside with Hannibal, and then followed him to the garage. Hannibal opened the garage door and they got into the silver BMW. Will wanted to stay awake until they stopped, but instead, he fell asleep almost as soon as he fastens his seatbelt. 

\-------------------------------------------------

When he woke up, the sun was high in the sky and they were driving down highway. His head was still throbbing, and his wounds still ached, but the pain was less. He gave a muffled, “Ow,” and swung his head away from the window, noticing that it was eleven a.m. He’d been asleep for about twelve hours. “Where are we?”

“Missouri,” Hannibal replied simply. “How are you feeling?”

“Better. Thirsty.”

Without looking away from the road, Hannibal reached behind Will’s seat and brought back a bottle of water and an ice pack, which Will gratefully accepted. 

“You must be hungry. We’ll stop at the first suitable restaurant we find.”

“’Suitable’?” Will asked after taking a couple of deep swallows, his voice and mind clear. “What’s your criteria?”

“Higher than yours.” Hannibal glanced over and gave him a playful smirk. 

Will rolled his eyes and felt a stab of hunger, his stomach growling. “So, I guess you wouldn’t be okay with just getting fast food?”

“Absolutely not.” Hannibal wrinkled his nose. “I will not allow you to consume something so horrid.”

Will sighed a chuckle and smiled slightly before something occurred to him. “What are we gonna do about money? Your card was frozen years ago, using mine would be a bad idea, and I don’t have much cash with me… Actually, all my cash was soaked by the water.”

“I have enough money on my person and in the suitcase.”

“Enough for food and somewhere to stay in Colorado?”

He threw another glance and smirk at Will and Will rolled his eyes again, wishing he was in complete control, but knowing that he would do whatever Hannibal wanted. 

\----------------------------------------------------

At three-thirty, Hannibal pulled into the parking lot of a Motel 6. 

“Are you certain that you would not rather rest in a luxurious hotel?” Hannibal asked for the thirteenth time. 

“Considering the fact that your name and face are in the news as the infamous Chesapeake Ripper and we shouldn’t spend too much money, this does seem like a more logical decision,” Will explained again. “You’re just gonna have to deal with a motel for one night.”

Hannibal sighed in an exaggerated, long-suffering way that made Will wanna rip his throat out with his teeth. “I suppose this will work. Depending on how decrepit the room is.”

Will rolled his eyes, made a noise of frustration, and got out of the car, standing against the car for a moment to get readjusted after sitting for about eight hours. 

“Are you all right, Will?” 

He looked across the roof of the car and saw that Hannibal was examining him with nothing but concern. 

Will nodded. “I’m fine. Just a bit sore.”

Hannibal went around the front of the car and offered his arm to Will. Though he appreciated the gesture, he still wanted to maintain some dignity, so he rolled his eyes again. “I should probably go in on my own in case whoever’s there would recognize you.”

“Will, you worry too much.” Hannibal started toward the main office and Will followed him, still walking a bit slower than normal. 

They were able to get a room without any difficulty, though Will was surprised when Hannibal asked for one king bed instead of two queen beds and he asked him about it as they walked back to the car. 

“A room with one bed is cheaper than a room with two. Aren’t you the one who said that we need to be careful with money?” Hannibal asked with a smirk. 

Will didn’t even bother responding and didn’t say anything else as they drove to a spot in front of their room and went in. 

“I hope you realize, though,” Hannibal said, fiddling with the stuff in his suitcase while Will stretched out on the bed, holding an ice pack against his ribs, “that I do have enough money that we could do more or less whatever we want. Including getting you a new wardrobe. Which we can do after we get settled in Hinsdale.”

“Do you actually have a plan?” Will demanded suddenly. “Beyond just going to Colorado?”

Hannibal stopped what he was doing and turned his head up to Will. “I believe it would be best for us to stay in Colorado until we are both fully healed and then go outside the country. Perhaps to Mexico. Or Canada. Or we could steal a boat and go to Europe. Whichever you would prefer.”

Will was silent for a moment. “You would actually let me choose?”

“Of course. I chose Colorado, so you can choose the next place. It’s only fair. Whatever decision we make affects the both of us and I would like you to be happy.”

“Did you let Bedelia pick Florence?”

Hannibal gave him a small smile. “The situation between you and I is a bit different than the situation between Bedelia and myself.”

Will smiled back. “For one thing, I’m not as passive or obedient as Bedelia.”

“No. You’re most certainly not,” he agreed, looking back down at his suitcase. “For one thing, she has never tried to kill me. Much less, tried to kill me three times.”

“And I assume you have never tried to kill her.” 

“I have not. Remove your shirt and come over here, please. I need to change your bandages.”

“I could do that myself, you know,” Will said, moving over to Hannibal nonetheless. 

“I do indeed know,” Hannibal replied, pulling his medical kit out of the suitcase and sitting beside Will on the bed. “I prefer doing it myself, though.”

He tended to Will’s wounds, gave him some pain pills, and then tended to his own and when he was done, he closed the suitcase and ran his hand over his eyes in a weirdly human and tired way. “I need to get some rest. I would prefer it if you would stay in the room, but if you need to go and take a walk or purchase something, there is money in the suitcase and the room keys are over there.” He gestured to the dresser that held the TV on top. 

Will nodded and moved to the ragged armchair in the corner, wanting to thank Hannibal, but not certain about what he would be thanking him for. He supposed he would be thanking Hannibal for giving him permission to leave the room and use some of his money, but he felt like that would be an odd thing to thank him for. So, he just sat there, staring at nothing, until Hannibal’s breathing became deep and even. When he was sure that Hannibal was completely asleep, he did grab one of the room keys and sixty dollars from the stack of fifty thousand dollars. He was mildly surprised that Hannibal had that much money with him, but he also wondered how they would be able to find a place to live with only that much money. He would ask Hannibal when he woke up. 

He left the room, making sure to carefully close the door. He walked down to the street and looked in both directions for a bit before starting to the right. His automatic instinct was to find a phone and call Molly to make sure she knew that he was alive and okay, but he didn’t know how he would explain that he didn’t know when he would be back. If he would be back. He knew that hearing her voice would make him need to run back to her and he didn’t want to feel that. He wished that he was still with her and Walter, but he felt like he needed to be where he was with Hannibal. He knew it wouldn’t make sense to Molly or Jack or anyone else because it didn’t make sense to him. He had a good life with Molly and Walter and Hannibal was a cannibalistic serial killer who had framed him for murder, nearly killed him, brainwashed him, sent someone to kill Molly and Walter, and so many other terrible things. But he still couldn’t leave. He didn’t want to leave. Despite everything, he still felt connected to Hannibal. It was almost like a drug addiction—no matter how much he knew that Hannibal was dangerous, he couldn’t do a thing to combat the fact that since he’d met him, there had always been a part of him that wanted to run away with the doctor. 

He meandered down the street in and out of a couple of stores. In one, he found a comprehensive book about every different dog breed and he remembered how Walter mentioned one time that he wanted to be a veterinarian and care for dogs and wanted to know everything about dogs. Will bought the book and continued walking around. He stopped in a local shop with handmade gifts and found an intricately crafted beautiful dream catcher. It wasn’t the kind of thing that Molly would think to get or ask for, but he thought it was something that she would like, and he bought that too. On his way back to the motel, he wondered how he would actually get the gifts to Molly and Walter. Maybe he should write them a letter whenever he and Hannibal get settled in Colorado and put the letter in a box with the book and dreamcatcher. He would have to remember to not include a return address. 

He was still attempting to figure out what he would say in a letter when he got back into the room and sat back down in the armchair, Hannibal still sleeping soundly. To pass the time, Will stared at nothing and composed several different drafts of a letter to Molly. After a couple of hours, his stomach started rumbling again and he went out again after grabbing some more money and found a local café, where he got a sandwich, a muffin, and coffee. He briefly debated getting something for Hannibal, but he didn’t know if there was anything that he would like and he figured that Hannibal could get something for himself when he woke up. Even so, he ended up getting a blueberry muffin for him. 

When he was in the room again, he retrieved the dog book, turned on the lap that Hannibal was turned away from, and started reading it. By the time he got to the Hokkaido a little after eleven, Hannibal stirred awake, retrieved some clothes from his suitcase, and went into the bathroom. When he came out, he stopped beside Will and looked down at his book. 

“Is that for you or a present for your wife or child?” he asked, kneeling down at his suitcase and putting his old clothes back in.

“Does it matter?” Will retorted. “I’m not exactly going to see them anytime soon.”

Hannibal studied him for a minute before looking back down. “Your business is your business. I merely request that you not let anyone know where we are.”

“Naturally.”

“Is this for me?” Hannibal asked, pointing to the muffin Will had left on the bedside table. 

Will nodded. 

“Thank you, Will.”

He shrugged. “I didn’t know if you would actually want it. There’s no people in it,” he added as a joke. 

Hannibal smiled and chuckled as he unwrapped the muffin. “I would be surprised if there was. And this is perfectly fine.”

“Hey, how are we supposed to find a place to live with only fifty thousand dollars?”

Hannibal swallowed a bite of muffin before answering. “I already own property in Hinsdale County.”

“Really? I thought you said you were planning on finding somewhere to stay.”

“I don’t believe I said anything to that extent,” Hannibal countered after swallowing another bite. “But yes, I do own property there and have more money hidden away there, so we need not worry about the money in my suitcase. That, I did tell you.” 

Will closed his book and put it back into the shopping bag. “Why do you have property in Hinsdale, Colorado?”

“It’s isolated,” Hannibal replied simply. “I enjoy having houses in various isolated places.” He finished the muffin and stood up. “Are you ready to go?”

“Absolutely,” Will replied, grabbing his bags and standing. 

Hannibal picked up his suitcase and opened the door. “After you.”

They left the room, returned the keys to the front office, and started driving again. They stopped a couple of times to get gas or food or go to the bathroom and by four twenty-two p.m., Hannibal was pulling into the rocky dirt driveway of a light wooden cabin situated on the edge of a mountain. It looked like a one-story house, but Will could see a hint of a lower floor around the edge of the cabin. 

“Do you like it?”

Will jumped a bit and turned to see a guarded, but hopeful expression in Hannibal’s eyes and he was struck by how he really did want Will to like it and it mattered to him that Will was happy with the house. 

“Yeah,” he answered honestly. “I do.”

Hannibal’s smile was so dazzling that it made Will’s stomach flutter. “Then welcome home, Will Graham.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will experiences a true reuniting with Molly and they discuss him going back to work for Jack.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter goes back to the morning after the end of Chapter One. I will be putting in chapters now and then about Hannibal and Will's adventures in Colorado, so rest assured that you will learn what they were doing for that month or so. Thank you to everyone who has read this so far and commented on it. I know the uploading schedule hasn't been super regular thus far and it's most likely gonna get worse since school's gonna start soon, but I will upload when I can.

The next morning, Will was having breakfast with Molly and Walter, most of the dogs gathered around them. Will still felt some lingering awkwardness at being back after so long, but Molly was acting the same as she had before and Walter was treating Will like his favorite person in the world, so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. When Walter had gotten home from school the day before, he’d run at Will and gave him a hug so tight that he had trouble breathing, surprising Will into silence, and since then, he’d asked Will dozens of questions about what happened with the Dragon and his past with the FBI and further back and looked up at him like he was a celebrity. 

“Hey, Dad, can I interview you later today?” Walter asked, taking a bite of cereal. 

Will glanced over at him in guarded curiosity while sipping his coffee. “Um, interview me for what?”

“For my English class, we’re supposed to write a paper about someone that we admire.”

His answer was simple, but it still struck Will. His heart and throat clenched with emotion and he had to try to clear his throat so that he could answer, “Um…Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.”

A bright and eager smile stretched across the boy’s face, his eyes sparkling. “Thanks, Dad! I’m really excited about this paper.”

“What you should be excited about is catching the bus,” Molly told him, sitting back down at the table with another cup of coffee. “If you don’t get going, you’re gonna miss it.”

Walter shoved the rest of his cereal into his mouth, swallowed quickly, chugged the rest of his orange juice, grabbed his bag, and headed to the door. “Bye, Mom! Bye, Dad!” He hesitated at the door and looked back at Will, his face uncertain. “You’re still gonna be here when I get back, right?”

It hurt him that Walter had to ask, but he forced the pain down and smiled at his stepson. “Of course, I will.”

The boy smiled broadly again before disappearing out the door and down the stairs. 

“He hasn’t been this happy in a long time.”

Will turned to Molly, smiling warmly at him, her hands around her mug. “I don’t know if I deserve to be the reason he’s happy.”

She shrugged easily. “I think you do. You did come back here, after all.”

“I also left for a month.”

She placed one of her hands on his and squeezed it gently, her skin warm from her mug. “You did. But now you’re back. Let’s both try and focus on that.”

He nodded and ran the fingers of his other hand across the back of her hand. He lost himself in the feeling of her skin beneath his fingertips for a while before he remembered something and looked back up at her, still in her robe. “Don’t you have to go to work?”

Her smile grew, and she shook her head. “I’m on paid vacation until next Monday.”

“Really? Why now?”

She shrugged with one of her shoulders. “I just needed a break. And hell, maybe some part of me knew that you’d be back now. Either way, I’m free until then, so we have plenty of time to catch up with each other.” Her eyes flicked back up to his and the expression and hunger in her eyes sent an electric spark of desire through where his hand touched hers and down through his body. He marveled for the first time since before he’d left how she could give him one look and all he wanted to do was take her upstairs to their bedroom. Before he could ask if she wanted to go upstairs, she looked down again, took a deep breath, drank some more of her coffee, and turned her eyes back up to him, most of the sexual desire gone from her eyes. 

“That actually reminds me of something that I wanted to talk about. Something I was thinking of talking about before you left.”

“Should I be nervous?” he asked lightly, keeping his eyes locked on hers. 

“No,” she replied, standing and grabbing their empty plates and mugs and Walter’s empty dishes. 

Will got up and joined her at the sink. “Let me take care of that?” 

She smiled at him and stepped back. “Be my guest.”

“Are you gonna tell me what you wanna talk about?” he asked as she sat down again. 

“After you’re done,” she replied simply, a playful smile in her voice. 

Will grinned at her back and rinsed the dishes and loaded the dishwasher as quickly and effectively as he could. When he was done, he sat back down across from her. “You ready to talk now?”

She put her phone down and looked up at him. “I was thinking that maybe we should have a baby.”

Whether it was because he hadn’t been trying to figure it out or because she had never actually given any signs of what she had been thinking, Will hadn’t at all expected her to suggest having a baby. He tried to think of some way to respond, but it was like his brain short circuited and wouldn’t work. 

“Well?” she asked him, a smile of amusement on her face. “What do you think?”

He was silent for a moment more before he was finally able to speak, blinking in confusion. “Uh… Why…? Are-are you…? Really? Are you sure?” 

She laughed a bit. “Yeah, of course. Like I said, it was something I was thinking about before everything happened. I love you and I want us to have a child together. Not that I’m not amazingly grateful to have Walter, but he’s also not your child. I just feel like you deserve to have a child who’s biologically yours.”

You know better than to breed. Hannibal’s words came into Will’s head without him consciously summoning them and even though he tried to push them away as soon as he thought them, they still affected him. “Molly, I… I don’t know if that’s a good idea.” 

Her smile fell slowly, and her eyebrows furrowed in concern. “Why not? Are you worried that any baby of yours would have your emotional issues?”

He was surprised that she had immediately guessed his biggest fear on the subject, but then he remembered just how smart she is. Of course, she would be smart him enough and know him well enough to be able to know what he was worried about. 

He nodded sheepishly, and she smiled at him, taking both of his hands in hers. “Will, do you know what I see when I look at you?”

“What’s that?”

“Someone who’s kind. Someone who is sweet and loving and extraordinarily brilliant. Someone who is so empathetic that he can understand the points of view of anyone else. Someone who will do anything to protect the people he loves. Any child would be lucky to have your genes.”

He shook his head in dismay after a moment. “But, Molly, I… I’m not a good person. Not entirely. I’ve killed people and I’ve thought about killing more often than anyone should. I have a lot of trouble relating to people and interacting with people. My empathy isn’t a good thing to have—it’s haunted me and caused me so much pain. I think my genes are more of a curse than anything else.”

“You know, my genes aren’t exactly super great, either.” 

He raised his eyebrows at her skeptically. 

“Okay, fine, they’re not as extreme as yours, but they’re not perfect. I’ve got a lot of stubbornness, aggressiveness, addiction, alcoholism, and a few other things. My point being that no one is perfect. But you have been a good dad to Walter and you would be a good dad to any child that we created. Besides, I know you want a daughter. You’ve mentioned it in your sleep a couple of times,” she added when he looked at her in confusion. 

You know better than to breed. 

“Hey. Will.” 

He looked back up from the table and saw more gentleness in her eyes than before. 

“Obviously, we don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, and I would be perfectly happy if we didn’t have a child together. I just think it would be a good thing for us.” She examined him and his eyes. “Is there something else beyond your own reservations about it?”

He considered telling her what Hannibal had said to him (he considered telling her everything about him and Hannibal), but something kept him from admitting it. He turned his eyes back to the table and took a few deep breaths before glancing back up at her again. There was so much kindness and love in her eyes and in her touch that it allowed him to picture a future where they got to raise a child that they created together. He imagined Molly heavily pregnant, both of them excited for their child. He imagined playing with their child, rocking her to bed, raising her and teaching her to fish and taking her camping. The thought of it gave him such a stab of intense emotion that his heart clenched, and tears came to his eyes. 

He looked back up at his wife, his throat tight, and nodded. “I wanna do it. I wanna have a baby with you.”

Her smile bloomed bigger and brighter than ever and she leaned forward and grabbed his face, kissing him deeply. They held each other as much as they could across the table and kissed for a minute or so before Molly sat back down, a gleam of desire in her eyes again. “Well, let’s get going then. We’ve got a baby to make.”

He stood up, took her hand, and they rushed up the stairs together and into the bedroom like a couple of horny teenagers. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------

“Does that actually work?” Will asked her about half an hour later. 

“You’re the genius. You tell me,” Molly replied from her position lying backwards at the head of the bed, her legs and hips up against the wall. 

“I’m only smart when it comes to criminals, not when it comes to getting pregnant.”

“It’s not a surefire way to make sure pregnancy happens, it’s just something to help,” she told him, her hands folded below her breasts.

“How long do you have to stay like that?”

“Not sure. But I’m gonna try to stay this way for an hour or so.”

“An hour?” he marveled, leaning against the headboard beside her legs. 

“I’m gonna try.”

“Want me to get you your phone or a book?” 

“Phone, please.”

He got off the bed and went to retrieve her phone from the kitchen table. When he got back, he took a moment to smile at the dreamcatcher nailed and hung above the bed before retrieving a book for himself and sat back down, handing Molly her phone. 

“Have you thought about if you’re gonna go back to work for Jack?” she asked after about ten minutes. 

“I haven’t actually thought about it,” Will admitted. “And I don’t know if I want to. Or if I should, really. Especially after how it turned out last time.”

“I will say that I more than slightly regretted telling you,” she admitted. “But more than that, I blamed Jack for you disappearing. I even smacked him,” she added, gazing up at him. 

“Really?” he asked in astonished surprise. “When? How hard? What did he do?”

Her playful smile stretched across her entire face. “A couple of days after you left when I went to his office to talk to him. I ended up ranting and yelling at him leading up to the smack. It was pretty hard; you could see the mark even on his dark skin. And he didn’t really do anything—I had a bit of a crowd by then and no one did anything—he just froze, and I froze for a moment before storming out. We’ve talked a couple of times since then and we’re on better terms now. He’s still not my favorite person and I still blame him for you leaving, but now I don’t wanna hit him every time I see him.”

Will shook his head and chuckled in amazement. “I can’t believe you actually smacked the head of the Behavioral Department of the FBI.”

“Am I your hero now?” 

Will maneuvered himself so that his face was over hers. “Oh, of course you are. You’ve always been my hero.”

“Best treat me like it, then,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively. 

He lowered his head and they kissed for a few minutes before she gently pushed him away with a loving smile. “That’s as far as we’re gonna go for now.”

“I am perfectly okay with that,” he replied, sitting back against the headboard. 

They were silent for a few minutes before Molly spoke up again. “Jack said that what you do isn’t easy on you, but it’s worth it for both of you because you save lives. When he first told me that, I believed that he just told himself that it was worth it for you and it was only really just worth it for himself, but Alana and Zeller and Price said that it does mean a lot to you, being able to save people.” She looked up at him again. “Was it worth it for you?”

“It was,” Will answered after a moment. “There weren’t many moments like it, but it was especially worth it when I caught the killer while he was trying to attack someone. It just made it more real when I got to see a person that I saved, rather than just the killer I caught. Does that make sense?”

She nodded. “It does… Alana says that it’s not good for you, though, doing what you do all the time.”

He took a deep breath, staring straight ahead before turning back to Molly. “Did I ever tell you what I see when I…get inside the minds of killers?”

“You know you haven’t. Even when we first got together, and you still had nightmares about it, you didn’t like to talk about what you did in the FBI or what you saw when you were asleep.”

“I don’t just see the murder happening,” he explained after swallowing. “I see it from the perspective of the killer.”

He saw the understanding and shock and horror come into her eyes as she fully thought about what he said. “Shit.”

“Yeah. Seeing yourself kill people in horrible ways day in and day out doesn’t exactly lead to complete sanity. My nightmares were much worse when I was regularly working for Jack. I would wake up in the middle of the night, gasping for breath, my shirt and sheets soaked with sweat, seeing victims and murders and murderers and—” He stopped himself just short of mentioning the stag, since it wasn’t exactly relevant. “Most of the difficulty I had when I was at my worst was because I had encephalitis, though. It wasn’t completely the work. And then when I wasn’t sick and still working, it didn’t affect me as much.”

“Did you still have nightmares?”

Will nodded solemnly. 

“So, is it worth it? Do you wanna go back to doing what you did? Or would you rather just stay here and go fishing and fix engines like you used to?”

He turned back to the wall and stared at it, trying to figure out how to put his feelings into words. He knew that he had to go back to Jack, that he couldn’t quit again. But he didn’t know how to explain that to Molly. 

“I can’t,” he eventually said regretfully. “I can’t go back to the way things were. I have to go back.”

He heard Molly sigh and say, “Walter is gonna be thrilled,” in a less-than-eager tone. 

He looked back at her in confusion. “Why would he care?”

“Because you’re basically his hero now,” she explained kindly. “He sees you as this cool guy who catches bad guys; it would be lame to him if you went back to being the engine-fixing fisherman.”

Will chuckled a bit. “Well, we can’t have me being lame, now can we?”

Molly smiled at him, but there was a concern in her smile. “Just be careful, okay? Don’t disappear again. That would hurt him more than you being lame… And I don’t know if I could handle that again.”

He sighed and took one of her hands. “I know. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

“Pinky promise?” She held up one of her pinky fingers. 

“Pinky promise,” he agreed with a smile, hooking her finger with his own pinky. 

“Guess you better call Jack, then,” she said, turning her attention back to her phone.

“Now?”

She gestured for him to go on and he grabbed his own phone from his bedside table. 

“Will,” Jack answered simply. In his voice, Will could hear hopeful expectation that he was trying to tamp down in case Will was calling to say that he wasn’t coming back. 

“Jack. Um, I’ve decided that I wanna come back. If that’s okay.”

Jack was silent for a moment, confused by Will’s last sentence, before saying, “Of course. You know we need you in the field. I’m actually on my way to a crime scene; I can give you the address and you can meet us there…if you want.”

“Yeah. Sure. I can do that.”

Jack gave him the address, said, “See you soon, Will,” and hung up. Will took a deep breath and looked down at Molly. “Jack wants me to meet him at a crime scene.”

“Now?” 

“Yeah.”

“You okay?” 

He took her hand in both of hers and squeezed it. “Yeah. I’m okay. For now, anyway.”

“Well, you better get going, then,” she said with a smile. 

“Don’t you think I should shower first?”

She moved forward a bit and sniffed him. “I think you’re fine. Get dressed, put on deodorant, maybe drive with the windows down, and you’ll be fine.”

He chuckled and got up to get dressed. Once he was done, he said goodbye to each of the dogs and left. 

The address was for a house about twenty minutes away from his and since he drove fast, it only took ten minutes for him to get there. The usual gaggle of police cars were there along with Jack’s car and the black van that carried Zeller and Price. Will parked behind the van and made his way up the lawn, putting on his glasses as he walked. Jack was standing on the porch next to the front door, talking to a police officer, and when he saw Will, he looked like he was as calm and composed as ever, but Will could see that he was eager to have him back. 

“Hey, Jack,” he greeted with forced ease as he stopped on the ground beneath the porch. 

“Will,” Jack nodded, looking him up and down. “How are you doing?”

Will shrugged. “Stable.”

“I’m guessing it wasn’t Molly who convinced you to come back.”

Will smirked and gave a breathy chuckle. “It was more of a mutual agreement, actually. Not that she’s not still angry with you.”

Jack tilted his head in a way that said her anger was an acceptable price for having Will back. “Well, come on in.”

He mounted the porch stairs and hesitated just outside the open front door before going into the house. Jack came to stand beside him as he looked at the scene and put a hand on his shoulder. “Welcome back.”


	4. Back in the Saddle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And off Will goes on a brand-new case and with a surprising and baffling new person.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I haven't uploaded in a while, but it's gonna get worse, what with school and my own emotional bullshit that I'm trying to manage, but I will continue this when I can because, like I said previously, I do have some shit planned. I will say that one particular event that's coming, when I came up with it in the shower and was thinking it through, I legitimately made myself cry. And I do not cry easy. Thank you so much to everyone who has read this and commented on this and given it kudos. Please tell me what you think and if you have any suggestions for anything that should happen with the new person in this chapter. I do have ideas, but I love more inspiration. Thank you all so much.

There was a pool of blood in the living room. Literally. In the middle of the living room, there was an inflatable kiddie pool filled with somewhat congealed blood. The furniture in the living room had been pushed against the walls and there were streaks of dried blood on one part of the pool and a bit on the floor. 

Will looked at the pool and then looked at Jack and simply said, “What?”

Jack smirked at him and patted his shoulder. “That’s what you’re here for. Welcome back.” He moved to stand in front of Will and beside the pool, Price and Zeller and some woman Will didn’t recognize poking around and taking pictures. “Thirty-three-year-old Zachary Dunn lives here alone and the police received an anonymous call about an hour ago. Caller didn’t say anything, just called from Dunn’s phone and hung up after a responder answered.”

“Maybe the killer wanted to brag about what he did,” Zeller guessed from where he was taking pictures of the streaks on the side of the pool. 

“No, if he wanted to brag, he would have said something,” Will said before he could actually think. “I think he just wanted to get someone here so the body and the blood wouldn’t have to sit here for long.”

“What do you mean?” Jack asked him, focusing on him just as intently as he used to. 

Will looked at the pool and around the room and thought for a moment before saying, “It’s just a theory—I would know more after actually seeing the body—but I think he did this and didn’t want it to stay like this for very long. Not because he respected the victim, but because he was…uneasy…about the thought of this mess staying here for a long time.”

“Why would he be uneasy about it?”

Will thought for a moment, walking up to the pool and looking down at it. “There’s not much blood anywhere here besides the pool. I think he prefers to have things as clean and neat as possible and he wanted this cleaned up as soon as possible.” He turned back to Jack. “Is there only one body?”

“I was gonna mention that,” Price piped up from where he was taking various samples from the pool. “There is way more than one person’s blood in here.”

“How many people?” Jack asked him. 

“I would say five, since people typically have 1.2 to 1.5 gallons of blood, while a kiddie pool of this size can hold 7.5 gallons.”

“So, where are the rest of the bodies? There’s only one in this house?” 

Price shrugged and looked to Will and Jack followed his eyes.

“Dunn’s body is upstairs in the bedroom,” Jack told him, tilting his head toward the stairs. “Come on.”

Will followed him to the stairs, but they were stopped by a voice behind them. 

“Jack.”

The two of them turned and saw a tall, Caucasian man in a suit standing just inside the doorway of the house. Behind his shoulder was a young woman who looked to be twenty-four years old. She was about Will’s height, pale, and thin, confidence, strength, and power in her stance, arms crossed across her chest. Her eyes were blue and sharp as they skittered over the crime scene, her brown hair tied back in a ponytail. She was wearing a black leather jacket, a tight dark purple shirt, tight black jeans, black high-heeled boots, and a good deal of makeup and Will saw a shine of glitter on her cheekbones. Her eyes flicked to Will’s and they stared intently at each other, Will seeing in her an extremely sharp and brilliant mind. 

A sharp snap sounded in his ear and he jumped a bit and looked over at Jack, who was examining him with slight concern. “You okay?”

Will blinked and swallowed. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Will, this is Special Agent Alan Cross and Ell Watson from the Behavioral Analysis Unit,” Jack explained, gesturing to the man and the woman. “Special Agent Cross is the head of the unit and Ms. Watson is basically their you.”

“I told Jack that we had our own Will Graham and he wanted to see her in action,” Cross told Will with an amused and slightly arrogant smirk. Will looked at Ell and she only reacted by looking down and away and reaching up to tighten her ponytail. “Especially since he wasn’t sure that you would want to come back to work.”

“If you’re so proud of having your own version of me, then why would you be willing to give her to Jack?” Will asked the Special Agent, still standing on the stairs above him. “Or are you so obsessed with money and your own ego that you’re willing to sell her like a dog?”

“Will,” Jack warned him. 

“Jack, he literally wants to sell her to you so he can not only have the bragging rights of finding the next me, but also getting money out of it. How much would you pay for her, Jack? This isn’t—”

“You do realize that we’re at a crime scene, right?”

 

All three of the men stared at Ell and she stared back at them before settling on Will. “You can preach all you want about human trafficking or whatever it is you complain about and yeah, Alan’s kind of a creepy asshat sometimes, but how about you save it until later and we just go up there and do what we’re here to do?”

She raised her eyebrows in a challenging way and Jack turned to him with a similar expression. He shook his head dismissively and gestured for Jack to lead the way up the stairs. Jack walked past him and Will followed him, Special Agent Cross and Ell Watson walking up behind him. He smelled the body before he went into the room and the smell was uncomfortably familiar to him. 

Jack stopped outside of a door on the right and gestured for Will to enter. The body parts were all separated and hanging from strings from the ceiling. Hands, feet, ribs, organs, the head, and even the torso hung suspended like a macabre mobile for an infant, everything clean and free of blood. As Will moved around the room, carefully moving around the body parts, he saw Ell moving similarly on the other side of the room. Cross started to enter the room, but Jack put out and arm and kept him back, looking in at Will and Ell. 

“How do you wanna do this, Will? She does a similar thing that you do—do you wanna do it separately or at the same time?”

“I’m fine with doing it at the same time,” Ell said from the corner of the room between a window and the bed, her arms by her sides. 

“Um, yeah,” Will told Jack after a moment. “Yeah, we can, um, we can do it at the same time.” He looked at Ell in confused curiosity, wondering how exactly she was able to do what he did and if she even really could. 

“Do you need any privacy?” Jack asked her. 

She shrugged easily. “It doesn’t really matter to me.”

“Well, Will prefers it, so we’ll be out here.” 

He closed the door, much to Cross’ irritation, and Ell looked at Will for a moment before she opened the window, sat in the sill, and took a deep breath, fluttering her eyes closed. 

Will moved to stand at the closed door, faced the room, and took a breath of his own, closing his eyes and watching the pendulum move behind his eyes. He opened them and saw the pendulum move back and forth until the body was intact and lying on the bed. 

“I’ve drained the blood of him and the others,” he said as he walked up to the body, a large, obsidian knife in his hand. He sat on the bed beside the body and leaned over it, cleanly slicing off the right hand before moving onto the other parts. “I dismember him as did not do to the others, because I want to honor him. I will make him into art.” He picked up the right hand and tied around it one of the many strings that was dangling from the ceiling. “He helped me and now I help him. He will be remembered.” He stepped back and looked at all the body parts hanging from the ceiling, the head facing him with closed eyes and a mouth held shut by the string. “This is my design.”

He opened his eyes and saw Ell still on the window sill, her eyes locked on him. 

“Are you done?”

He briefly furrowed his brows at her and blinked. “Um… Yes. Are you?”

“I’ve been done. You can come in now,” she added, speaking louder. 

The door opened behind Will and he moved to the side and stood against the wall three feet from Ell. Jack looked at Will and Cross looked at Ell, both seeking explanations.

“This isn’t the first person he’s killed,” Ell said as Will opened his mouth. “It is the first person he’s done this to, though. He did drain the blood from all the other bodies, but them, he disposed of in a dismissive way. They didn’t matter. He just wanted them for their blood. This man, however—the killer wanted to honor him. He wanted to make him an art piece. Well…he or she wanted to make him an art piece.”

“How many other people did he kill?” Cross asked her. 

“Four others,” Will replied as she opened her mouth. “Enough to fill a child’s inflatable pool with blood.”

“Why the pool?” Jack asked him. “What’s the purpose of it?”

 

Ell started to say something, but stopped and closed her eyes, furrowing her manicured eyebrows in confused frustration. Jack looked at Will and raised his eyebrows expectantly. 

“It could be ritualistic,” Will suggested, rubbing his eye underneath his glasses. “Did anyone find anything in the pool?”

“They didn’t check for anything. Yet. Why?”

“There probably is something in the pool and depending on what it is, the killer could be representing a baptism in blood,” Ell chimed in. 

“That aside, what else do you have?” Cross questioned. 

“He used an obsidian blade to cut the victim apart,” she answered immediately. “The cuts are too clean to be from anything else and he was able to cut the pieces really easily.”

“You said he wanted to honor the victim, to make him an art piece. Why?”

She opened her mouth to answer, but before she could say anything, Zeller appeared behind Jack. 

“Jack, we need you downstairs. You’re gonna wanna see this,” he said, slight fear in his eyes.

“What is it?” 

“We found something in the pool.”

Jack cast a look at Will and Ell before following Zeller back downstairs, the other three behind him. When they got downstairs, they saw Price placing a human head into a body bag and the woman Will didn’t recognize fishing around in the pool with one hand. 

They were all silent for a moment before Jack asked Price, “Dunn is the only one who lives here. Right?”

“Officially, yeah.”

“So, who is this?”

“That’s what we’re gonna figure out.”

“Whoever she is, she’s certainly ahead of us in terms of knowledge,” the woman said with a comedic smile, pointing her index fingers at Jack, one of her gloved hands dripping blood. 

Jack glared at her and Price and Zeller stared at her in surprised confusion, but Will noticed Ell smiling broadly and laughing silently. 

“Stupid,” she murmured under her breath. 

“Just from the head, I would say that this woman was in her early twenties,” Price told Jack after a minute. “Might be a relative of Dunn, most likely one of the people whose blood is in this pool.”

Jack turned to Ell standing on Will’s other side, arms crossed over her chest. “You said that this could be a baptism with blood. You still think that?”

She shrugged, a hint of a smirk still on her face. “I think so, yeah.” She focused on the pool and took a deep breath, fluttering her eyes closed before opening them again, a blank expression on her face. She stared at the pool without blinking for several moments before she blinked rapidly and looked back at them. 

“The killer knew her, just like they knew Dunn. Dunn was close with her in some way, maybe a relative or a lover or something, and the killer thought that they had both sinned enough to deserve death. But even though they thought the woman deserved to die, they wanted the woman to have a chance, so they baptized her.”

“In blood?” Jack asked incredulously. 

“I didn’t say they wanted the woman to have a chance in Heaven.” Ell locked her eyes on Jack and stared at him intently. “They knew she was going to Hell for some reason, and I think they thought that if they baptized her in blood, then she would have some place of power in Hell.”

Jack stared back at her before looking to Will for confirmation. 

Will examined the pool and moved across the room to look at the head, which the woman across from Price held up for him. He knew that he probably should do what he did to see if Ell was right, but he didn’t think he needed to. What she said felt right and he was willing to go with it. And he would rather not do what he did in an area where there were a lot of other people around. He moved back around the pool and back next to Jack. 

“I think she’s right,” he told him. 

“You think, or you know?”

Will took a deep breath and cast his eyes around the room before settling back on Jack. “It feels right enough that I believe it.”

“Why don’t you double check her?”

He removed his glasses with one hand and rubbed his eye with one knuckle before replacing his glasses and looking back up at Jack. 

“Everybody clear out,” Jack ordered the room. “Outside now.” 

“But what about the head and body?” the woman near Price asked. 

“We’ll deal with it later. We won’t be outside for long.”

“Well, can we at least go upstairs to start dealing with the body? Since Will and her have already done their thing upstairs?”

Jack considered her for a moment before addressing her, Price, and Zeller. “You three upstairs with the body. Everybody else, outside.”

“Does that include me?” Ell asked calmly. 

“Yes, that includes you. Everybody out now.”

Price, Zeller, and the woman headed upstairs and everyone else moved outside, leaving Will alone in the room. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and watched the pendulum swing again. 

A couple minutes later, he went out the front door and stood next to Jack. “She’s right. From what I can tell, anyway.”

“Any idea about who this killer is?”

“I would guess it’s a priest or reverend. Someone who knew both victims.”

“What about the other people whose blood is in the pool?”

“He had the blood when he came here.”

“Any idea where the bodies are?” 

Will shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Jack turned to Ell, sitting on the porch railing and leaning her back against the house, Cross standing in front of her. “What about you? Any idea about the other bodies?”

She shrugged. “I dunno. Like I said, though, the killer most likely disposed of the other bodies in a less important way. They didn’t care about the other ones apart from their blood. But they were probably also people who they thought were sinners in some way. I agree that the killer is probably a person of power at some church that the victims went to.”

“Well, okay. Let’s find this psychopath.”

\---------------------------------------

“Found him.”

Will, Alana, Cross, and Jack all looked at Ell as she came into Jack’s office and leaned against the doorway, a hint of glitter still on her cheekbones, arms crossed across her chest.

“What do you mean, you found him?” Jack asked after a moment. 

“I mean, I found the guy who killed those people.”

“Ell, it’s only been a couple of hours. You couldn’t have found him that quickly.”

She shrugged firmly. “Well, I did. I found the church that Zachary Dunn went to, went there, found a guy who seemed like the guy, talked to him, checked out his office and then his house, and found out that he is the guy. Wanna go arrest him?” 

“Wait, what exactly makes you think that this man is the killer?”

“I pretended I was some helpless hooker trying to look for a better life, but my pimp wouldn’t let me and asked him if there was anything I could do about it and he gave a spiel about how there are some people in the world who are destined for Hell and need a little push to get there faster and those people are keeping good people from being good people, et cetera, et cetera, blah, blah. I also asked him if he could help me give my pimp that push and he told me that he could take care of it.”

“Did you actually give him someone’s name?” Will asked her. 

“Nah, I told him I needed to get some shit sorted out, but I’d be back later. I also found an obsidian knife in his house, where he lives alone. Naturally.” She reached into her jacket and pulled out a sheathed blade inside a large Ziploc bag. “And naturally, I took the knife.”

“Ell, you can’t just break into people’s houses and steal their things,” Alana told her in shock. 

Ell looked at her in confusion, holding up the knife. “But I got the murder weapon.” She tossed it at Will and he caught it with a startled feeling. “You’re welcome.”

“Ell, you can’t—”

“It is against regulation to do things like that,” Jack interrupted calmly, reaching out to take the knife from Will. “That said, we’ll get this to Price and Zeller and see what they can get out of it. But, I don’t want you or you,” he said with a look at Will, “doing anything until we get definitive proof. Got it?”

“Jack, you can’t seriously—” Cross started.

“You are in my house, Cross. And you will do what I say.”

Cross looked at Ell and back at Jack and sighed, running his hands through his hair. “Okay, then. Your call.”

“Good. Ell, where are you going?” he asked as Ell turned out of the doorway. 

She slowly turned back and gazed back at him with a bored and blank expression. “To my apartment. This is gonna take a while and I haven’t slept since yesterday morning. I’d like to get some sleep. If that’s okay with you.”

“That’s fine.”

“Will, I’d also like to talk with you before I go.”

“About what?” he asked her.

“You smell like dog. I wanna know about your dogs.”

Jack furrowed his brows in confusion. “How is that important right now?”

She sighed angrily, went back into the room, grabbed Will’s collar, and pulled him out of the room, Cross holding up a hand when Alana and Jack started to get up. 

She dragged Will down the hall and around a corner before letting him go. He straightened his collar and breathed a bit before looking at her, her eyes bright and intense. “I’m guessing this isn’t actually about my dogs.”

“Wanna go arrest a bad guy?”

“Just the two of us?”

“Don’t act like you haven’t done that before.”

Will considered her and thought for a moment. “You really don’t think we should wait until Price and Zeller find something conclusive.”

“Oh, we probably should. I just don’t want to.”

“You’re absolutely sure that this man is the killer?” 

She nodded slowly. “Wanna go? If not, I’ll go myself.”

“Look, it really won’t take long for them to get fingerprints. How about I get you some lunch and then, if they’ve found proof, we can go arrest him. Does that sound okay?”  
“If they haven’t found anything by then, can we go arrest him anyway?”

Will considered her for a moment before saying, “Yeah, fine.”

She smiled in satisfaction. “Great. Let’s go get food.”

\-----------------------------------------------

“So, what do you see? When you do what you do?” 

Ell shoved a few fries into her mouth and chewed and swallowed before answering. “I see the killer doing what they did. Obviously, I don’t actually see who it is, I just see them as a human-shaped black figure. What do you see?”

“I see what happened through the eyes of the killer,” Will replied, sipping his coffee. 

“So, you see yourself killing people,” Ell stated, taking a huge bite out of her tuna salad sandwich. 

Will nodded, chewing his grilled chicken sandwich. 

“That’s gotta royally screw you up. No wonder you retired for three years.”

Will put down his sandwich. “It’s not easy, but it wasn’t the reason I retired.”

“So, what was the reason? Was it Hannibal Lecter getting arrested? Or was it the massacre at the Verger house? Or was it a combination of those and what happened at Lecter’s house eight months prior to that?”

He considered her questions for a moment, sipping more coffee, his glasses folded in the pocket of his jacket. “Honestly, I think it was a combination. After what happened at his house, I knew I needed to find him and then after everything that happened, I just…” He shook his head and returned her probing gaze. “I just needed a break. How old are you?”

“Twenty-three… You thought I was older, didn’t you?”

He shrugged. “Only one year older. Since you do what I can do, why didn’t I know about you before? Where are you from?”

She rolled her eyes. “I was wondering when you were gonna ask.” She took another bite of her sandwich before answering him. “I’m from California and that’s why you haven’t heard of me.”

“Even so, I should have heard of someone else like me in the FBI.”

“I’m as much officially a member of the FBI as you are. And I’ve only been working with Cross for a year.”

“What did you do before then?” 

“Are you gonna finish your fries?”

He pushed his plate towards her and gestured for her to go ahead. She grabbed several French fries and at them all at once, took a long drink of Coke, and then breathed deeply for a bit. 

“This isn’t actually my real job. I mean, it’s a job, but I don’t actually get paid much for it, so I have another job as a stripper, slash dancer that sometimes includes singing. It’s what I did back in San Diego before I moved here, and it made sense to keep doing it.”

“Did you go to college?”

“Naturally. I went to UCLA and graduated two years ago.”

Will took a last bite of his sandwich. “Were you working as a stripper during college?” 

She nodded around her sandwich. “Off and on since I was eighteen.”

“Why?” Will asked her in confused concern. “There are so many other things you could be doing. Why would you start doing that in the first place?”

She shrugged. “It’s easy money. I’m gonna be an attractive female either way, so might as well capitalize on it.”

Coming from anyone else, the words would have sounded arrogant or narcissistic, but the way she said it made it sound more like a statement of fact than anything else.  
“Does it bother your parents that you do that kind of work? Does it bother them that you’re here doing this?”

She stared at him solemnly for a while before looking out the window. “I don’t have parents anymore. They died in the Santa Monica shooting back in 2013.” She looked at him like she was trying to convey some deeper meaning but didn’t say anything more.

“I’m, um, I’m so sorry,” he said to her. 

She stared at him for several more moments before looking away. “It’s fine. It’s been five years.”

Will didn’t know what to say. He could tell that there was something she wanted him to know, but for some reason, she couldn’t tell him what it was. 

“Can I do anything for you?” 

She looked back at him without moving her head. She stared at him like she was trying to read his mind before sighing. “No. I don’t think so.”

Will started to say something, but his phone rang before he could. “Jack,” he answered. 

“Price got finger prints off of the knife. They belong to a man named Dalton Shaver, a priest at Grace Church, the same church that Dunn attended. The head was identified as Rebecca Morris, Dunn’s girlfriend.”

Ell grabbed Will’s wrist and moved the phone towards her mouth. “That’s most likely one reason why Shaver had a problem with her—the ten-year age difference between Dunn and Morris.” She pushed his wrist back to his own face. 

“Was that Ell?” Jack asked, suspicion in his voice. 

“Yeah, we’re at a restaurant getting lunch.”

“So, she didn’t go home to sleep?”

Ell grabbed his wrist again. “I didn’t lie, if that’s what you’re thinking. I really haven’t slept since yesterday morning and I really would like to go home and sleep, but that’s not what I needed to do.” She pushed his hand back again and he held it between them in case she wanted to talk again. 

Jack sighed deeply. “Either way, you were right about who the killer is. Will, I’ll send you the address. Both of you meet me there in ten minutes.”

He hung up and Will pulled his arm back. 

“So,” Ell said excitedly, a smile growing on her face. “Ready to go catch a bad guy?”


End file.
